Daily Times

PEF shoulders the state’s burden by educating children through a network of around 7,700 partner schools across 36 districts.

Four years into signing the Sustainable Development Agenda 2030 and almost a decade after the introduction of Article 25-A in the Constitution of Pakistan, only marginal progress has been achieved to granting universal access to quality education in Pakistan.

The participation rates continue being low with around 23 million children of school-going age still out of school, while those enrolled continue to perform low on mathematics; science and languages.

If the report by the National Education Assessment System is anything to go by, students score below 50 per cent on average in languages, mathematics and science at both grade four and grade eight.

Gender disparity in access to education along with other equity challenges also remains stark in Pakistan.

Nevertheless, education has witnessed the highest allocation of budgetary resources by the federation and provinces combined in the last several years, which is second only to the defence budget in terms of its volume.

For instance, 2018-19 saw the cumulative allocation of PKR 980 billion for education.

This shows an increase of 222 per cent compared with the allocated budget for education by the federal and provincial governments in 2010-11.

Unless a considerable change is observed in government’s approach to educating our children by efficiently utilising existing fiscal resources, in all probability, we are very likely to miss out on achieving SDG-4: inclusive and equitable quality education for all children, by 2030.

PEF initiated its first program in 2005, where it targeted selected private schools and started providing financial and technical assistance to improve the quality of education being imparted to the students at these schools

Fortunately, the state can substantially optimise its approach and achieve greater efficiency in delivering education by partnering with the private sector and leveraging its potential. In fact, the education foundations across all provinces have been playing a vital role in this regard. Punjab shows a great case study of this role by demonstrating how well public-private partnerships in education can be leveraged with greater efficiency in achieving various education objectives, i.e. enhancing school enrolment and improving student learning achievement at lesser expenditure per child than mainstream public schools.

One of the conduits for undertaking public-private partnerships in education in Punjab, the Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) effectively partners with the private sector through its two major contracting arrangements: subsidies and vouchers.

PEF initiated its first program in 2005, where it targeted selected private schools and started providing financial and technical assistance to improve the quality of education being imparted to the students at these schools. PEF soon initiated its second program in sub-urban localities aimed at improving social justice and providing equitable educational opportunities to the marginalized strata. It then initiated another program specifically aimed at opening new schools in partnership with the private sector to expand access to education in areas that lacked educational facilities. Fast forward to 2019, PEF now supports the highest enrolment – around 2.6 million children – as compared to other education foundations in the country. The foundation shoulders the burden of the state by educating these children through a network of around 7,700 partner schools across all 36 districts in the province.

However, all this improvement in access to education does not go without a strong emphasis on ensuring the quality of education imparted through PEF partner schools. Apart from routine monitoring and feedback to partner schools, summative assessments are conducted regularly as well as performance-linked finance.

Two major factors have helped establish the merit of PEF as an effective conduit for pursuing 25-A and the SDG-4 2030 agenda in Punjab.

1) PEF has proved to be a cost-effective alternative to regular public schooling in the province. The average cost of educating a child in PEF schools per month is as low as Rs 705, in comparison with the cost of Rs 1,659 per student per month in public schools.

2) Students enrolled in PEF schools outperform their counterparts enrolled in government schools. The official statistics show that PEF students have achieved an average score of 83 per cent in six-monthly assessments as compared to the average score of 68 per cent attained by students enrolled in public schools. In other words, PEF offers a more quality-focused and cost-effective vehicle in order to ensure increased access to education.

Despite the fact that the socio-economic context varies from province to province, the evolution of PEF as a response to the challenges of access, quality and equity remain relevant for other education foundations in other provinces.

Increased dialogue and experience sharing across education foundations would go a long way in positioning these agencies to take on a greater role in the pursuit of SDG-4 and 25-A. Taking PEF as a case-study, there is a need for provincial governments to leverage the potential of the private sector through a public-private partnership. Therefore, it is crucial to enhance and articulate the role of education foundations in the provincial education sector plans, education policies and other strategic documents till 2030 in general and for the next five years in particular. Moreover, it is equally important this is complemented with increased allocation of budgetary resources in upcoming years.

The writer is a research fellow at the Institute of Social and Policy Sciences, Islamabad